Charles Dickens

This disc contains the Dickens' classic "A Christmas carol" with Lucy Skeaping and her ensemble performing delicioulsy seedy pub songs. This disc also contains behind the scenes footage from the movie "Uncovering the real Dickens."

Nothing is quite as it seems in this lush retelling of Dickens' classic coming-of-age story with colorful characters: conspirators, rogues, rakes, and wretches.

On Christmas Eve, the ghost of Jacob Marley, Scrooge's late business partner, comes to haunt old Scrooge and give him glimpses into his past, present and future. Frightened by the visions he sees, Scrooge wakes up a new man, vowing to change his miserly ways forever.

In 1836 young Charles Dickens was commissioned to write a series of humorous stories about the misadventures of the members of a fictional English social club. Dickens called this organization the PICKWICK CLUB, named after his central character, one Samuel Pickwick. He and his friends set out on a cross-country journey, and through a series of innocent misunderstandings, they wind up entangled in a comedy of errors that builds to monumental proportions....

Local MP and schoolmaster Thomas Gradgrind raises his children, Louisa and Tom, in the utilitarian fashion, stressing reason and fact and dismissing imagination and emotion. Under his influence, Louisa grows cold while Tom turns to a secret life of drinking and gambling. To be nearer her brother, Louisa accepts an offer of marriage from his boss, the self-mad, self-important banker Josiah Bounderby, though she does not love him. But soon finds...

In the gloom of a country graveyard, a young boy encounters an escaped convict, a chance meeting that later leads the boy to tragedy, mystery and wealth.

Ebenezer Scrooge begins the Christmas holiday with his usual miserly contempt, barking at his faithful clerk and his cheery nephew. But when the ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Yet to Come take him on an eye-opening journey revealing truths Old Scrooge is reluctant to face, he must open his heart to undo years of ill will before it's too late.

Born into a miserable workhouse orphanage, Oliver eventually flees to London, where the cheerful Artful Dodger immediately befriends him and introduces him to the villainous Fagin and his gang of thieves. Temporarily rescued from the prospect of a life of crime by the kindly Mr. Brownlow, Oliver finds himself pursued by savage thief Bill Sikes and the enigmatic Monks.